I'm falling apart at the seams,

Don't sew me up.

Don't attempt to know me,

I am imperfect.

I'll always come loose,

And make a mess of my insides

On your outside.

August 28, 2012

If what I have to offer isn’t enough for you— my looks, my conversation, my drive,

by all means 

Leave.

I have got enough of

All of the above

to fill myself up. 

There isn’t a void here for you.

Find someone to tear down who isn’t whole. 

I am entirely made up of myself. 

I am witty and clueless, I know nothing about anything and everything about nothing, 

and I live laughing and crying and repeating the vivacious vicious cycle that is my life. 

I look at myself in the mirror now and I smile 

because I glow for me. 

Healing

      I took advantage of the time I had off and went to see my family in Long Island. We’re such a mess, but it’s our mess. I used to want to escape that. I would spend most of my time on my phone or on the computer or in a room sleeping, but things change when you get older. You start missing the chaos of your family because it’s so small next to the chaos of your life outside of that.

       I missed the small space my mother takes up on our sofa and how I always sprawl myself out on top of her like a personal pillow. The times when she’s speaking and I look at her like there’s a part of her I’m supposed to be occupying and she’s in my way. I missed the way my little sister is always the outcast. She finally has friends now so we never see her. She’s in the stage I was at her age and I understand it. I’m glad I can understand. I missed the way Calvin’s face lights up every time he sees me. I was happy to finally reply yes when he asked me if I was staying until Sunday. I find it funny that he stopped asking people to play with him outside and because of that I went to play basketball with him in the rain. It turned into a family tournament. Him and I against his mother and father. We won. I missed my older sister’s loud mouth in the morning screaming “Cock-a-doodle-doo!” I missed our family dinners. I forgot what it was like to sit down at a table at home and enjoy the company of those closest to you. I missed our family dip. This weekend my sister made a new one that wasn’t so popular, but there wasn’t any left when we were done. I missed our family movies. I missed sitting wrapped up in my mother’s arms as we argue over which movie on sale we would watch. The women always win. I missed watching home improvement and real estate shows. We always bet on which house the couple will take or whether they will keep or leave the home or whether they did a good flip. Somehow in all of that finding jokes about the host’s hairline. I even missed the arguing, the crying, and the misunderstandings. No day goes by without at least one of those because we make sure to spend every waking moment with each other. 

          My mother is in a hard place, well really, everyone there is. There is a lot of tension in the house on a usual day and you can still feel it underneath the level of jokes and smiles we’re used to. We all know what will eventually happen. No one talks about it, but everyone feels it. It was nice to be able to put all of that aside for one weekend and just enjoy life, how it used to be. The family. The Baldi bunch. The family that may never be again, but is always preserved in that moment. I didn’t want to come back to work. I didn’t want to come back to the city. 

I wanted to stay in the small place between my mother and the sofa we can’t put our feet on

Wrapped up in her small arms under a throw blanket

With our feet up on the ottoman we call a mushroom

Watching late night television and laughing so hard we snort. 

        It really sucked to have to go back to work right after all of that. I miss my family, but family is far away and I’m here trying to make a living to make life easier, for all of us. To show them that we’re capable of more. All of us are capable of so much more, but no one has fully reached or tried. Sometimes I want to give up, too. I think of how easy it would be to live a lazy life. To take the alternate route. Then, I remember how hard my family actually has it even if it looks good on the outside. My mother worked way too hard to show me that I was capable of more. She has way too much trust in me now to let her down. She is positive I will make it and that gives me strength when I don’t want to be strong anymore. Trust me. There are plenty times I don’t want to be strong anymore, but I have to keep on swimming so I don’t drown, for all of us.

A few good quotes for the soul

"Character, like a photograph, develops in darkness."

— Yousuf Karsh  

"Respect yourself enough to walk away from anything that no longer serves you, grows you, or makes you happy."

— Unknown

"Why are you stingy with yourselves? Why are you holding back? What are you saving for—for another time? There are no other times. There is only now. Right now."

— George Balanchine

"Life happened because I turned the pages."

— Alberto Manguel 

"And I figured out that the reason I couldn’t get through the day as well as I can now is because I had too many things on my mind, on my plate, you know, for one person to have. So I started to eliminate some of the things that were too heavy to carry and unnecessary."

— Erykah Badu

July 23rd, 2012

      Honestly, I should be crying right now. Things are becoming a huge mess. What happened last night is still lingering on my mind. It’s one out of the many things that is scary about my life right now. I never thought I would be one to be card scammed. I feel like this is bad karma biting me on the ass (for reasons I won’t reveal here). I feel like I’m hardly going to use my card anymore and then I wonder if that even matters. I find myself retracing every use and wondering where or how it could have happened. I use my card very frequently. I rarely take out cash because I find I have more control of what I spend if I don’t have cash on hand. To try to find a positive in this, I will now be really safe with my card and safe with my money. I’ll track my spending a lot more and that will probably cause me to spend less. I just wonder why me? Also, I know of people who do card scams and I know you can practically get that information anywhere which is one of the reasons I never put my real name anywhere. So, this could have also been an inside job. The internet is real these days. I just wish that person endless bad karma for doing this to someone who (1) doesn’t deserve it and (2) doesn’t have the money for it. Until my bank returns my money (if they do), I can’t even pay my rent so fuck you whoever you are. 

        Besides that, all of the stability I thought job searching would bring me is kind of downward spiralling on me. Today, I have to have a very awkward conversation with my manager that can pretty much throw me off a cliff. Honestly, I have no one to blame, but myself for how weird this can go. I haven’t been the best to him and the best here in my last year because I’ve been so unhappy. If I had been a little nicer and a little less comfortable it might have made the convincing much easier. On a positive note, I know I can find another job. The problem is finding one that works so perfectly with my fucked up school schedule. Do I take another semester off to be able to keep my lifestyle and save money? Can I really afford to be set back practically another year? What if this ends up as a loss anyway because of future plans for the building I’m in? Am I going to have to go back home and have the thought of all the wasted money at the expense of temporarily living alone on my mind? I can’t go backwards. I promised myself I wouldn’t allow myself to go backwards in life in any way— jobs, relationships, living situation. I’ve really had so much on my mind concerning my work and school function that I’ve been doing what I do best. Ignoring it. Ignoring everyone. Not speaking about it. Not writing about it. Just living my day to day life pretending everything will work out in the end. I have to wonder if it even will…

      I even ignored my mother for a little while and I speak to her about everything. I finally spoke to her yesterday and she told me something I needed to hear:

“Ashley, I never worry about you. You can disappear on me for weeks— no calls, no texts. I know you’re okay. You know why? Because you always work it out. You’re a huge procrastinator, you leave everything down to the last minute, and you fall apart momentarily, but you pick all of the pieces up and you make sense of it— every single time. You work extremely well under pressure and you will figure it out.”

I hope she’s right. Usually, I figure it out, but this time I’m not so sure. All I know is that I am so grateful to have her. I am grateful to have the kind of relationship we have worked so many years to have because since I’ve been on my own she has always come in and given me hope. I never feel alone.

      While I’m expressing my gratitude for the relationships in my life, I would also like to add in that I am grateful for every single one of my wonderful friends who have really just been there for me. For being my support system in so many ways, big and small, without even knowing it. For saving me, in a way. I used to feel myself falling apart at the seams because I didn’t know my worth and underestimated my capabilities. Sometimes, I need a reminder and there is always someone there to shove it down my throat until I get it. For showing me that I deserve more, sometimes without even trying. For loving me despite my faults and even if you don’t “love” me, for caring. For showing me that love comes in so many forms and is just as fulfilling. I used to feel like I was missing something, but I am so whole now because I have so much love in my life. Really, for giving me hope. Enough hope that despite everything that is going haywire in my life I am not crying— I am still smiling, laughing, and loving. Although I am stressed and worried, I am not sad. I really feel like it’s because the last few months have just been so good to me even in the moments when they were not so nice. I feel like it’s because I have love. I’m hoping that love is enough to get me through the decisions I have to make by the end of the month. If nothing works out the way I want it to, I know that love will get me through whatever comes from those decisions and that alone is a reason to keep smiling. 

“Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at it’s destination full of hope.”

Maya Angelou

July 14th, 2012

Your pupils said everything, they were three times the size of your blue iris’

When you looked at me with that intensity I couldn’t shake

I wouldn’t dare to complain about the way you spilled into my lap

Or in between my parted legs in the small space our small bodies occupied perfectly

Inspiration in Thrilling Places

July 10,th 2012

        Tonight needs a blog post because it was amazing, but I’ll start with the good part of my morning. Really my whole day went quite well despite a few drawbacks. I had an interview with Baked By Melissa that I think went well, but I don’t want to jinx myself so I’ll wait for an offer. Let me explain how amazing the Baked By Melissa company is regardless if I attain a position there or not. How it came to be, the motivation, and it’s growth is inspiring. The overall vibe at Baked By Melissa is innovative, fun, and inviting. I know that company is going to continue to be extremely successful. On a related note, this week is the week of interviews actually. I had an interview with Brooklyn Industries yesterday, Baked today, and tomorrow I’m heading in for a second interview for American Apparel. The excitement is unbearable. With three interviews back to back, which happens to be my favorite number, I’m hoping for at least one call back. If not at least I know that I am capable, with my experience and partially my personality/ overall look, of getting a decent amount interviews. From a million no’s springs a yes, eventually.

         About tonight, thanks to Bennett Bennett or Ace, I attended a celebration event for the rebranding of the Madison’s Browne Fellowship at Pranna on Madison. The venue was beautiful and being there alone was an experience in itself. The people were real people in and students of the advertising world, but most of all, they were amazingly nice. I received so much great advice and stories of experience tonight. I have to admit I was afraid and even until the end still a little shy, but in the most beautiful way.

         It was thrilling, it was exciting, it was inspiring, and it was exactly what I needed. I also need a push and luckily I had Bennett, Jack, and Bibi to nudge me into the crowd. I can’t stress how amazing Bennett is because he knows absolutely everyone. All I had to say was that I was a student at City College and someone would say, “Oh, do you know Bennett?” I guess what I’m trying to say is thank you for the millionth time and I won’t be happy until people recognize me so easily. I met many inspirational people, received cards from people who are genuinely interested in helping me find my place in the advertising world (or out of it), and have a much better view of a potential game plan for the future.

       I needed tonight and these interviews for my soul. Any kind of doubts I have had about myself are slowly being released. The more I speak to people and the more I interview the more I realize that I am an interesting person with a lot to give to the world regardless of whether these opportunities take me somewhere. I realized things about myself I didn’t even know until I voiced them. After hearing myself speak to people and seeing how they respond I feel… well, amazing. I can have some kind of effect on someone and eventually, potentially, a group of people and beyond. I’m exhausted in some of the best ways: from hard work, from putting myself out there, and from experience. I’m voiceless, practically running on E, and so completely happy.

        Thanks to tonight, I know where I potentially fit. I know what excites me. I know the thrill I need to have in my life. I know what I need to work on. The energy all around me is amazing and I’m right I need change. I strive for and survive off of change and off of good energy. I’m ready for a new chapter in life. The only question is if it is ready for me.

My sentiments exactly...

“The purpose of relationship is not to have another who might complete you, but to have another with whom you might share your completeness.”

—	Neale Donald Walsch

Dulzura

Make love to me in Spanish.
Not with that other tongue.
I want you juntito a mi,
tender like the language
crooned to babies.
I want to be that
lullabied, mi bien
querido, that loved.

I want you inside
the mouth of my heart,
inside the harp of my wrists,
the sweet meat of the mango,
in the gold that dangles
from my ears and neck.

Say my name. Say it.
The way it’s supposed to be said.
I want to know that I knew you
even before I knew you.

— Sandra Cisneros, Dulzura

I can't turn back to so heavy a page with imperfect fingertips.

        I’m still deciding whether you should be a part of my novel and my closet or just my novel.

         I used to think throwing away the physical proof that something once existed was like throwing away memories. Our bodies become untouched with time. Our minds filter in and out information and we forget. I pick up objects and remember the way I felt in that moment. I still remember things I don’t want to. I still recall memories I had thought were long forgotten. I used to think that I would be nothing without my memories until I felt the urge to forget. 

          So, I said let go. The more a person tries to forget the harder it becomes. I said let go that night in the moving van after keys were left on table tops belonging to mothers that knew the end result. I said let go when I threw out the box of papers with familiar handwriting like I didn’t want to recognize the fact that my fingertips once crossed and looped lines to form something that would cease to exist someday. I said let go when I found cloth and metals at the top of my closet hidden way back behind my new life. I said let go when I smiled once in a familiar place by accident. My eyes widened at the thoughts zooming up from under my new ones.

           Instead I kept everything I thought was worth keeping, but honestly I was wrong about how memories exist. Yours are still at the back of my closet and I think about burning them from time to time. I think about the bubbles that would form on your skin and burst pain back into you, but that is all just a morbid fantasy of mine. I would probably just burn myself and cause scars on my fingertips for thinking I was ready to let go.

            Now, I hold onto these physical things for a different reason and some days it pains me. I feel the numbness of my fingertips as I stare at my closet or on those days I reach for my iron back there. Sometimes it is so hot back there I wonder if I left it plugged in and I flinch. I remind myself that some day it will cool. Maybe that day I will donate those physical things to the collection of lost memories I used to like to remember or maybe I will break my tradition. I might stop hoarding the physical components of memories that I do not need to keep. Then, maybe everyone’s story will truly be condensed into the words I give myself and nothing more. Each memory will be a chapter instead of a box and I prefer reading. 

May 9, 2012

I love you for your olive undertones— even in the fairest. I love the way your hair is thick and unmistakable. Beautiful, full, and dark or light. I love you for the way your body is built like the islands. Your curves take shape like the unpredictable outskirts of land. And the way your body moves with congas— and sometimes guiras because you know the sound of a guira like the sound of your breath. I love you for the way you’re bright and fiery, like the sun is closer to the equator. I love you for the way you are violent like the oceans that surround the place where your ancestors came from, And then calm like after the storms that wash the streets and the people with water falling from the metal roof of the houses your distant family lives in. I love you even when you forget about these things in a new place. I love you even if you’re just learning them from a different place. I love you because your blood is the lifeline that links you to long lost Latin lovers that made it possible for you to be here. I love you because your DNA formed perfection in the brown, blue, green, or grey eyes you inherited from someone along the line that lived— Simply, And in that olive skin that allows me to trace and feel your culture in the crevices of your creation. I love you because you are the reminder of how deep Latin roots travel into the center of the Earth, waiting to be discovered and explored.

I lied about wanting you.

I wish there was a hint of want in me to tell you

That all of this is because I’m exhausted

Instead I rather see you fight the days you miss me

Because it makes me feel important

So, when you’re fed up and wiping tears away

Just remember that I was honest

If I told the truth about nothing else,

At least I was honest about being dishonest.

April 12, 2012

Everything started off in less than vivid shades of black, grey, and white. Sunsets were beautiful because they were natural phenomena, but colorless ones that didn’t seem bland until I met you. Staring at stars was a nightly ritual for me. The stars were magical and because of that they were beautiful. I didn’t know then that I hadn’t known real beauty. Then, I met you. The sea had always been a vast wonder, but I didn’t know the deepness of it’s colors. I only knew that when I looked down upon it I could see my reflection and when I looked out at it’s lengths I would feel so small.

People told me that the texture of money and the reflective property of gold were the characteristics of the only things that make happiness real. I had seen sunsets, star-filled night skies, and the sea, the seemingly endless sea, but I still believed their theory of real happiness. Then, I met you.

You were glowing lavender and I instantly fell in love with color. In the first moment, like the medieval, I declared that you were etheric; the composition of everything I had ever seen and known. You filled up all of the space in between the stars and made them. You made up the moon, the sun, and earth for me. I could now see the sunset in all of it’s radiant colors and the contrast of the sparkling stars against the midnight sky, but now your lavender aura preceded the beauty of the world. Even the blues and greens I could finally see that flowed and crashed against the unforgiving sand in foamy white wonder wasn’t enough for me. All because when I looked down on the sea’s glass-like surface I could no longer see the reflection of myself. I could only see the reflection of you staring back at me. It’s lengths were no longer enough to make me feel small because meeting you made me feel so enormously full of love.

Meeting you showed me that those people were oblivious. There was no way they had ever experienced true love because all I had to do was meet you to know the characteristics of what actually makes happiness real.

April 12, 2012

I wrote today and it was the worst writing I’ve done in a while. I’m rusty and washed up. I need motivation and a muse. Being alone and happy doesn’t help fuel my writing whatsoever. It’s as if I forget all of the pain and happiness brought to me by different people. I simply move on with my life and leave it all behind. Does this mean that no one resonates with me? Or that I have been blocking everyone out to save myself the head or heart aches that come along with emotions and emotional attachment, and in turn jeopardized my creative abilities?

I’ll blame it on being tired and distracted either way, but I think I’m slowly figuring myself out. I think I use people for self satisfaction. The attention, affection, moments, and everything in between are things I desire because they move me. Otherwise, I feel unaffected by life. In a sense I feel numb most of the time and people make me feel, momentarily anyway. That seems to be all I want anymore. I want the moments and their emotions for me, but not the person. I never want the person. How selfish of me to be cruel enough to use someone for their attention and emotions knowing that I, most likely, will not actually want the person in the end.

I’m selfishly feeding my ego by draining it out of other people. The transparent “happiness” that I derive from that is worthless in the end. It escapes me.

I have got a lot to work on and figure out about myself. I’d be less of a bitch if I could drop my ego and my need to feed it. Back to where this started off, I think I’d be more creative because I wouldn’t need a single motivation or muse as much. I’d be driven by everything around me that I hadn’t noticed before.

March 5, 2012

That feeling, that wonderful and terrible feeling of being tightly wound in your arms and pushing your hair back knowing that I may be the one to hurt you because I’m too shallow. I’m a puddle trying to be an ocean for you. It will take me a long time to accumulate enough depth to be able to accept you for everything you are and everything you are not. I grew up an asshole in a asshole place and no you aren’t perfect enough to fit into the mold I’m trying to place you in so others will accept you, too. I still care about what other people think and I’m an asshole for that. I’m not perfect enough to take you for the good and the bad. I’ll give up like I always do. The only thing I wonder is why I don’t just give up on you now before I hurt you. Yes, I’m that selfish. Yes, I’m that shallow. I keep holding you here without enough depth to submerge you in me. I keep pretending I’m an ocean for you, but I know soon enough you’ll stand up and realize the feet I promised you were only inches. I keep trying, but I don’t know if I can give you more that even though I feel for you so deeply.

February 26, 2012

Even if I disappear because I know you won’t let me come back, I won’t forget the way the birthmarks on your back feel under my fingertips. The way I can tell you like me to push your hair back and kiss your forehead. The way you like to hold my hand especially when you’re driving. The way you have to hop to keep up with me because you’re so small, but the way you also make me feel small in a good way. The way you pronounce your words in such a way that no one could ever mistake you for a brash New Yorker. The way you are so damn rough and not smooth at all. The way you never judge me so it reminds me to work on not judging you for anything (physically/mentally) or anyone. The way I’ve never wanted to talk to someone all the time the way I do with you and how you brought back me loving to talk on the phone for hours. The way you look in your uniform and the way it brings out your blue eyes. The way you look in your bathroom with your blonde hair down because it’s always wrapped up. The way you make me so happy that I’ve finally found someone I can have an intelligent conversation with. The way you are so completely different from anyone I’ve ever spent my time seeing. The way you love your job even when you hate it and the way you open me up to it. The way you open every door, always pick me up, and refuse to let me pay for anything. I can’t keep going without sounding like I’m in love and I’m not in love, but I appreciate you. I notice you and all the little things that make you. I want to keep you, but I’m a realist.

October 21, 2011

The lies are like toxins that never leave your body,

You know nothing about redemption.

You kiss like you’re up to no good,

You hold like nothing is permanent,

And your eyes say that you’re used to getting your way.

November 5, 2011

At the very tip of my spine
I can feel the wretched scrunching of my hope
Right before it reaches my skull
My brain can’t even sip it.

My shoulders have no rest,
They rise to my ears in scrutiny of the life before me.
They say, “you should of, could of”
And I say, “I would of”
To no avail, they stay lifted to the sky in pain. I feel like a puppet now.

I could say I hadn’t a clue of what would come or what could of came if I ignored it all, but I knew.
I acknowledged laziness, and the world spun around me like moments seized with no work and all play.

Now, that time has caught up to me.
I’m so stern, so uninviting, and all of the pent up anger seeps out through my pores.
Everyone can smell it on me.
So, some push farther away and some inch and leap forward on top of me.

You would think that my attempt to become equidistant from everyone would prevail.
But everyone wants to know and everyone has something to say and no one understands, but they’re all looking in on the show.

And, mostly, I just wish I was mute
Because to explain a story is to ruin it
And all of the pieces don’t yet fit.
No matter how much I keep hoping for an alternate ending,
I keep pushing in the opposite direction,
Opposing myself in the most forceful way,
Thinking I’m taking the path of least resistance,
But there is no relief here.

Dulce

if you keep talking to me like that you’re going to get us in a lot of trouble
if you keep telling me how sweet my being tastes
we might have to meet up and exchange recipes to happiness
like remedies to sadness
I told you I want you to be the brightness in every dark place of my being
I want to taste you in the convenience of my small bed
so I can watch night turn into day
watch the sun peak through my window
and fall on the small of your back
I can trace it as it slowly lights up your spine
to give my thanks in kisses on your collarbone as you sleep
and taste the sweetness of your voice
as you whisper “good morning”

A Story of Words and Deadlines

I said
You've changed me.
You said you don't want to hear the differences between them and you
You want me to show you right now
But you won't let it happen.
I said
Stop controlling this, let go.
You said you're like a switch with only two options of infatuated or uninterested
And you sound like a familiar ironic picture I saw floating around the internet.

I was not amused.

I just want you to know that I notice the sensuality in your movements undernear the hard exterior
Because, baby, you're hard to swallow.
You're not smooth like cigarette smoke on a city's summer night.
You're more like those really drunken nights where someone gets belligerent
Because you don't know the difference between Houston Street and Houston, Texas...

And yet, I accept you not because I'm lascivious,
But because you're different,
And you make me different in the best way.
Just yesterday,
I was callous.
Today,
I'm open.

Today I say,
Stop acting like we have an expiration date.
Trust me, I'm going to show you, but you have got to let things move slow.
I promise I won't go, if you don't.

And you smile complacently.

2/13/12

The ashes are piling up,
I used to say I didn’t litter,
Now my butts line the blocks i frequent
Guiding me on the same path I choose day in and day out
We’re all doctors here
I’m no better
Self diagnosis:
You’ve got direction OCD
Obsessed with the order in which you step
Carefully placing yourself back into the footprints you set in concrete from the day you arrive anywhere.
You claim change, but you are no different than yesterday
Stuck in your ways,
In your cozy little rut,
Claiming that you’re hunting down true freedom,
While being a slave to daily whatevers and on and ons.

All this damned smoke is blocking my view.
However, I can still clearly see the coffee rings
Stained on my clothes and around my mouth,
“Why don’t you save some fucking money by cleaning up your act?”
Wipe your fingerprints off the lives you think you touched
And be done with it.
How many unfulfilled, self proclaimed prophecies settle in the nook of your mind a day?
I’ve never been a clean person.
The only thing I can organize is an essay
And I half-ass that, too.
I wish I could give someone advice I actually follow,
But I’m too busy inhaling man made things
Hoping to be as good as a man someday;
Working, running, and being strong enough to do a woman’s job anyway.
Lifting heavy spirits that aren’t even mine,
What’s a man going to do with that anyway?

I’m flirting with the way caffeine makes my hands tremble with anxiety.
I take it unsweetened to prove a point.
I’m strong enough to drown in the darkness
While being covered in ashes
And they are starting to taste good— that’s what scares me.

2/10/12 #2

I want you to know that you’re a coward for fucking me like it was revenge…
Pretending that you were a man on top of me
Knowing you were continuing the curse of lies about love for lust
That you so purposely fulfilled and now extended into the after life of us.
See, we died a long time ago,
But we had a lot of scares that ended with us in an emergency room of make up fucking that I called making love because it seemed to stitch up our leaking relationship, like a wound
That would never heal because you kept ripping my heart apart over and over again.

The time we actually lost our pulse, I started heading toward the light to let go,
Fed up, without grieving, and unwilling to fight
While you kept crying and fighting because you could kill, but you were afraid of being murdered,
As I slept calm, ignoring you, and occasionally screaming for you to let it go.
You once said something I should have engraved in my head for the the future,
“I just don’t want to feel this way anymore. When will things switch back to the way they were.”
And you meant with me crying, with me being the one dying, with me feeling like the smallest person in the world.
You see, I should have remembered that, but when we reminisce we never remember the bad or the red flags or the moment we realized we didn’t want what we had anymore.

I want you to know that you are a coward for fucking me like it was revenge.
For grabbing me by the neck, ass, back, and slapping me the way you know I like
For remembering the rough things I would ask you to do to me
And the rough things you liked that you introduced to me that I loved
And fucking me that way.
For forgetting to slip kisses into the moments of ecstasy I expressed thoroughly
And for forgetting that “I love you”s were what made me really drip down into the depths of the oceans we used to create on a bed we called our own before you soiled it with other female’s drops of momentary lust.
For forgetting to hold me in a real way when we were done and instead for washing off the moments that had just happened that were still clinging to your skin
And also itching me in your bed as I waited.

For really not forgetting anything at all because it was all a part of your plan—
Making sure to see the reciprocal of where we last left off before you dropped the defibrillator and gave up.
I was still alive, but barely, and you were too exhausted, too stubborn
Like three times, weeks, was enough effort to bring something so violently murdered for three years back from the dead.
I was supposed to magically heal and make you my king again like a miracle of the gods.
There were no gods on our side when we died because we mutually believed in nothing.

I just want you to know that you are a coward for fucking me like it was revenge.
Like your small amount of heartbreak was worth murdering for.
If that’s the case, I owe you death in any life you are reincarnated.
Just know that you won’t be a king in any other because traitors can never be kings and, though malevolence is sometimes used to describe a king, you’re more like a bad omen.
You killed my spirit again, but this time didn’t hurt that bad because I expected it, but didn’t see it coming as you stabbed me in the back before my head hit the pillow.
By the time your hands were between my thighs you had already dragged the knife down and ripped out my spine.
Paralyzed by old feelings I just let it happen— twice.

You already knew you couldn’t feel the emotions lined on my lips when you didn’t touch them,
But I already hurt you,
And I deserved it right?
You handed me my spine and wrapped my unmoving fingers around it
Completing the finishing touches to your masterfully planned murder and then you left.
Real serial killers don’t act out of revenge, cowards do.

2/10/12

“You can tell a lot about a person by the way they like their coffee.”

I like mine unsweetened and black.
So, that makes me think of you and your blank stare when I made jokes you didn’t want to understand.
Occasionally, I take mine sweetened by hazelnut and light by soy
And this reminds me of you, too.
The way once in a while I’d say something right and you might actually crack a smile
And it felt like a reward
That would make my whole day,
But someone or something always ruins my hazelnut caffeine high
And that also, reminds me of you
Because we didn’t have a day of rest
And you had a lust problem.

I have a hard time swallowing coffee because I never liked the taste,
I’m just addicted to that feeling it gives me and it seems to give me a purpose to be awake
And that reminds me of the way I never liked you, but I was addicted to the pain you caused me because it gave me a purpose to be alive. I would have settled for any emotion
(ironically, you killed me, my soul, as addictions do).

When I don’t have my coffee I’m cranky because of my caffeine deprivation
And it reminds me of all the days you denied me of love or even acknowledgement
And how in nearly three years I could never go more than a couple days without you— and I never had to.

And sometimes I’m reminded of you because I catch you swimming in my coffee
Saying things I used to like
And smiling with your smile that I once didn’t admire, but grew to love
And then I remember that I’m not that person that liked those things that you said with your smile that I loved that I no longer do.

Finally, the only appealing thing about my coffee is its deep brown hue like your uneven skin.
I can remember tasting the darker portion of your birthmarks,
Finding a bit of sweet in everything that was bitter about you.

I find it funny that I can find my deepest memories of you in a single cup.

The Desiderata (1927)

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love,
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.


—Max Ehrmann

Jan 21, 2012

I followed him into the dark feeling that he could feel the pleasure this caused me. I stayed close to him and the wall as we walked. The small hallway seemed much longer now. The anticipation of what he would say to me was overwhelmingly overflowing out of my heart and into my veins to be transported all over my body until I could feel it everywhere. He had no intentions other than his primal instinct, but I didn’t know this then. I couldn’t think of anything else other than the way his arm felt draped over my torso. It was familiar, not the same. I could have felt his indifference in the way his hand laid limp on my side, but I wanted to believe that this was his way of missing my skin.